Chad has carried around a Leatherman Super Tool since 1996. It has proven useful many, many times since, but for the last year he carried it, it just wasn’t working correctly. He asked for and received a new one for Christmas from his wife. Hurray! After bonding with his new tool, he learned about the company’s 25-year warranty. 25 years? Why, his old one was only 16 years old when it went out of commission. He sent it along to see if it could be repaired. He was sad to learn that it couldn’t.

No, not because he had somehow voided the warranty: it couldn’t be repaired because that particular model had been retired.

I would like to tell you about some great customer service I experienced recently from Leatherman.

But first, some history. In 1996 my parents got me a Leatherman Supertool for Christmas. I carried that tool with me wherever I went. I used it at school (back when it wasn’t unusual for a young man to carry pocket knives with them), at work, and everywhere in between. Truly, it was a marvel of invention.

However, during the last couple years it started to show its age, becoming nearly unusable in the last year. A few months ago my wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas, so I looked online and after doing some reading decided on a Leatherman Skeletool CX. She got it for me, and I love it!

A couple days after Christmas we went to Leatherman’s website where I learned about their 25 year warranty. Figuring that I had nothing to lose, I filled out the appropriate forms and sent my old Supertool back to Oregon. After a few days I received an automatic email saying that my repaired/replaced tool was on its way.

I received my package today, opened it up and found a new Leatherman Supertool 300! They replaced my 16 year old tool with the latest model. The accompanying letter apologized several times for not being able to repair my tool since it had been retired a long time ago, and many safety upgraded had been made to that line.

It isn’t often that a company will guarantee their stuff for 25 years, let alone replace your old model with a brand new one, no questions asked, so I wanted to give a shout out to Leatherman for their great service! They’ll have me as a long time customer, and I recommend them to anyone who need a compact tool set.